Nick Barley announces writers from 55 countries at festival will shake up Britain’s parochial readers and showcase Scotland as an outward-looking nation
The UK’s parochial reading habits are an embarrassment, according to the director of the Edinburgh International Book Festival. Nick Barley has introduced his sixth and most globally ambitious programme, which includes authors from North and South Korea, as well as first minister Nicola Sturgeon interviewing her favourite Scottish crime writer, Val McDermid.
Describing the festival, which runs from 15 to 31 August in Edinburgh’s Charlotte square, as “the most international ever attempted in Britain”, Barley accepted that many names would not be familiar to a British audience. “But what I want to get across is that these people are megastars in their own countries,” he said.
International highlights include Hyeonseo Lee, a North Korean author who describes her flight from the regime; the Colombian writer and politician, Sergio Fajardo; and three leading poets from the Innu First Nation people of northern Quebec, who will perform in their native language of Inuktitut.
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Describing the festival, which runs from 15 to 31 August in Edinburgh’s Charlotte square, as “the most international ever attempted in Britain”, Barley accepted that many names would not be familiar to a British audience. “But what I want to get across is that these people are megastars in their own countries,” he said.
International highlights include Hyeonseo Lee, a North Korean author who describes her flight from the regime; the Colombian writer and politician, Sergio Fajardo; and three leading poets from the Innu First Nation people of northern Quebec, who will perform in their native language of Inuktitut.
More
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